


to the mock courtroom

by joisattempting



Series: look over there it's a wild falsettos college au [9]
Category: Falsettos - Lapine/Finn
Genre: Backstory, Crack, Debating, F/F, F/M, I CAN’T SHUT UP ABOUT IT SOMEONE HELP, I Don't Even Know, Inspired by The Lord of the Rings, M/M, it’s literally just crack i’m sorry, kinda??, marvin and mendel are lotr buddies, mock courtrooms, please don’t hate it, sfjdndn i’m not sure about this one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-12
Updated: 2019-11-12
Packaged: 2021-01-29 10:40:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21408841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joisattempting/pseuds/joisattempting
Summary: marvin and mendel settle an argument.
Series: look over there it's a wild falsettos college au [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1518932
Comments: 12
Kudos: 36





	to the mock courtroom

**Author's Note:**

> welcome ladies, gentlemen, and everyone in between to part nine of the worst idea i’ve ever had  
i really did try with this one, but i was a bit iffy about it idk man  
please give it a chance?
> 
> i took some inspiration from @Justacityboy’s “The Discourse™️“! it’s one of the funniest things i’ve read, and courtrooms are a big theme in this :)
> 
> anywho, enjoy! comments and kudos are greatly appreciated!

“See, here’s the thing,” Mendel said, putting his hands together and leaning forward, as though he were about to tell an astounding secret. All was black in Marvin and Whizzer’s room, the only source of light being the sickly white glow of the crescent moon through the drapes, and the harsh, red numbers on Whizzer’s beside alarm clock. They glared scrutinisingly at the two, as if silently judging them for still being awake at such an hour. Speaking of Whizzer, he was turned on his right side in bed, where he would remain for a mere few minutes before flipping over to his left - the man wasn’t a very deep sleeper. The additional whispers on Mendel and Marvin’s account didn’t exactly help either. “Samwise was the real hero of Lord of the Rings,”

They’d had this debate since high school, never once reaching a conclusion or simply agreeing to disagree. Mendel was determined to enforce his point on his stubborn opponent, and Marvin had too much pride to realise and understand the psychology major’s thinking. Supposedly, the argument originated on the former’s seventeenth birthday, during the summer of eleventh grade. After a lengthy, passionate phone conversation about everything pertaining to the series - they’d just found out about each other’s interests in the books and movies - Marvin and the others were invited over to marathon the three movies, coming up to a grand total of ten hours and twenty-three minutes spent at the Weisenbachfeld residence. By the time the end screen rolled for the third and final movie, Whizzer was asleep and Trina’s eyes were red from crying. Charlotte, too engrossed in the happenings onscreen, yelled profanities at the screen whenever a character did something that was, in her opinion, idiotic or stupid, at one point waking Mendel’s youngest sister at nine PM that night. They’d had to allow her to finish the series with them so she wouldn’t tell her mother about the aspiring doctor’s colourful language. 

Sleepovers, such as these, were commonplace. The two campus residents packed a duffel and stayed the night at Shrek’s Swamp. In some cases, multiple nights. These practices even dated back to freshman year of college, when Mendel and Trina would sleep on the floor in the dormitory belonging to the other four. Of course, with an entire apartment, it was more spacious and comfortable, with no noses being stepped on and broken on water quests. However, that wasn’t to say shenanigans never occured; Whizzer had dented the wall in a reaction of fury during a late-night Monopoly game the previous year, and Cordelia had broken the bedframe while trying to recreate Titanic with her girlfriend and falling off the bed. 

Marvin rolled his eyes. “That’s where you’re wrong, Mendel Joseph Weisenbachfeld. Frodo’s the hero because, number one, he took the fucking Ring to Mordor, and number two...there doesn’t even need to be a number two. He destroyed the Ring, which literally obliterated all evil, so that’s a pretty big deal, if you ask me,”

“Okay, yeah, but he couldn’t have done it without Sam,” Mendel pressed. “And let’s not forget, he was the Ringbearer for some time,”

Sighing, Marvin scrubbed a hand down his lightly-freckled face. They’d been at it for a good hour at this point, bringing up new arguments containing a surprising amount of detail considering how fatigued they were, and then dishing out weary rebuttals and picking apart any points the opponent made. Around forty-five minutes in, Mendel had suggested drawing the informal debate to an unresolved close and going to sleep. However, Marvin, being the overzealous law student he was, was adamant on staying up. He had to reach an answer to the age-old question. “But he didn’t do much else. Just carried some pots and shit,”

Mendel had to use every ounce of his strength to not lurch at the curly-haired man before him. “There was a lot in that bag!”

As if on cue, Whizzer groaned in his sleep, turning over. His face was scrunched up in irritation while he fidgeted. Marvin glared pointedly at Mendel, putting a finger to his lips. And then, he had an idea. “I know how we can settle this,”

Mendel rubbed the back of his neck. “By sleeping? That’s a pretty good idea,”

“No, you heathen. We’ll use the mock courtroom in the law block,”

Indicating the alarm clock to their right, the psych major nodded in its direction. “We are not using the fucking mock courtroom at two in the morning. I don’t know much about Callahan, but he sounds scary, and I’m not about to get into deep shit with a professor that doesn’t even teach me,”

Quirking an eyebrow, Marvin crossed his arms over his faded flannel pajamas. “You’re just saying that because you know you’re going down,”

“I’m yelling timber,” 

The brunet stared at him through his glasses.

“Forget I said that. Anyway, we can’t do this alone. Don’t we need people to back us up?”

Marvin snapped his fingers. “A jury? We could bully the others into helping us. You’re gonna have to wake Char up, though. I’m still terrified from last time,”

“Fine. But you owe me,” Mendel sighed deeply, flicking a stray ebony curl from his drooping eye. He could already infer that his friend’s half-baked idea would end in shambles by the time morning rolled around. Nevertheless, he showed no desire whatsoever to return to the godforsaken subject for as long as he lived, and hey, he wanted to see how everything would turn out. So, swinging his legs off the side of the bed, he stumbled over to the Chicken Coupe to wake the girls. 

Almost rolling off his messy bed, Marvin walked the paltry few steps to where his roommate was fitfully sleeping. He almost couldn’t rouse him, but after a couple seconds of creepily staring at the soft, tranquil expression on his face, he finally put a hand on his shoulder. Whining quiet nothings, Whizzer turned over again. “Whiz, it’s me. You gotta get up, we’re going to the mock courtroom,”

“‘It’s fuckin’ morning already?” he mumbled, his R sounds hardening with every word - Whizzer’s Midwestern accent often grew thicker when he was sleepy. Could Midwestern accents be “thick”? Marvin didn’t know, really. However, he did know that Whizzer swore like a sailor in his slumber. 

“Kind of. It’s two,”

“Oh, fuck off,”

“Please? You need to back me up on something,”

“Is this one of your little... fuckin’... nerd arguments? With ‘Del?”

Marvin was almost offended. Almost. “No,” he said matter-of-factly. “It’s a very serious question that needs answering, goddamnit. And you’re going to be on my side,”

“Forget it,”

“I’ll give you five dollars. And you can bring food with you. Callahan doesn’t have to know,”

Whizzer scowled like he’d never done so before as he shoved his feet into shoes. 

And so, the mock courtroom was where they found themselves at two forty-five in the morning. It was a bleak, plain room, with a wooden judge’s bench and a jury box. A large American flag was affixed to the back wall. The ones being forced to testify had done haphazard research on the topic at hand, and were seated in the gallery, quick fingers typing out arguments on their phones. It was a sight for sore eyes; six baffled students, in various different sets of pajamas, half-heartedly making speeches about a topic they knew next to nothing about. 

Mendel cleared his throat. “Ladies and gents, we are gathered here today, or is it tonight?” he shrugged. “We are gathered here to-whatever to decide on who really was the hero of the Lord of the Rings series. I’ll be honest, I don’t get why we’re here, because the answer is obvious, but we’ll keep it fair for the losing team,”

On that note, the debate commenced. Cordelia played the judge, and she’d even hurriedly put curlers in her short, blonde locks for the occasion. The two defendants assumed their positions on opposite ends of the judge’s bench, going over the notes on their phones a final time before they were called to the stand by the extremely underqualified Cordelia. Meanwhile, over in the jury box, Charlotte had fallen asleep, and Whizzer was chewing on a cookie to keep his eyes open. Trina looked around confusedly.

Loudly, the blonde banged the gavel against the raised podium. “Silence in court!”

“Nobody did anything!” Whizzer yelled. 

The girl purposefully ignored him. “I’d like to call Mr. Marvin Alexander Feldman to the stand,”

“Why are we using middle names?” the mentioned law student squinted at her. 

“I’m the judge, I make the rules,”

“That’s not-“

“Shut up, or you’ll lose your case,”

Childishly, Marvin stuck his tongue out, marching over to the middle of the room to present his case. Even now, at an ungodly hour of the morning, he felt the burning need to impress. He’d ensured to create some sort of mental word bank, so he could bewilder his opponent with complex law terms and lengthy, descriptive words that he wasn’t sure he’d heard of until twenty minutes ago. The only flaw in his strategy was Trina, who could probably recite the definitions to the words he spouted with ease, as well as jeer at him for using them incorrectly. “In conclusion, the story wouldn’t have been centered around Frodo if he wasn’t the protagonist,”

“Thank you,” yawned Cordelia. “Mr. Brown, do you have anything to add to your defendant’s claims?”

“The fuck is a defendant?” Whizzer scrubbed at his eyes. He was no stranger to the squabbles of his friends, but it had never been taken so far as using a mock courtroom. Sometimes, their disputes wouldn’t be in person. The radient light of Marvin’s phone screen against their pitch-black bedroom was more than enough to keep him awake. Yet he found himself listening as intently as he could while the law major spoke. So this was the Marvin all the professors whispered about. This was the kid that every student taking the course feared and aspired to be simultaneously. Marvin. His friend Marvin. Whose resounding voice could probably be heard from miles away. But he wasn’t shouting. Just projecting. Gradually, Whizzer could hear his accent thickening, which gave him all the more reason to tune in. He could never grow tired of Marvin’s voice. Even if he talked for twenty-four hours straight.

Beside him, Charlotte, awake but unhappy about it, nudged him. “You are the worst lawyer I’ve ever seen. And I can tell you that as a med student,”

Without warning, Cordelia hit the gavel against the judge’s bench. She wanted to speed things up as much as she could, because her girlfriend looked debilitated, and her eyelids threatened to flutter shut again. However, the blonde was grateful for her staying awake. If it wasn’t for Charlotte herself, then maybe it was for her. And, quite frankly, Cordelia couldn’t ask for much else. “I’d like to call Miss. Trina Abigail Aronowitz to the stand,”

“Wait, why is she testifying for you?” Marvin called out from his seat next to the judge, his brows furrowed. 

“Because she knows more fancy words, and therefore can and will defeat you,” Mendel said, sticking his tongue out at his opponent, who looked as though he’d been slapped. 

And defeat him she did. Going at a frivolous pace, Trina managed to explain three points in substantial, prodigious detail. She’d thrown some of the most difficult words she knew into the mix, her tactic being to bewilder Marvin to the point that he wouldn’t be able to rebut her argument, because, quite simply, he didn’t understand it. Mendel could only smirk at the opposition from his seat, which very nearly made a laugh escape her chapped lips. 

“And now, the judge and the jury will make an informed decision,” 

Both parties fidgeted uncomfortably as the blonde led the jurors out of the room for deliberations. Marvin lifted his head, blue eyes locking with Mendel’s brown. He smiled, pushing his glasses further up his snub, upturned nose. Despite their petty quarrels, the law student had to admit that he owed a lot to the guy. The countless times he’d visit the Weisenbachfeld residence, located in a run-down suburb helped greatly with his ever-dwindling self-esteem. Every Tuesday, after their last period PE class, they’d thunder upstairs to Mendel’s cramped bedroom, with its striped green bedclothes and overflowing laundry basket. While he’d make a start on his homework, Marvin lay sprawled on the bed, blue eyes gazing into the cracked paint on the ceiling, all the while allowing his pending troubles and issues and pressing home problems to escape him as he told Mendel every miniscule detail. Whenever these makeshift therapy sessions had started, Marvin remembered, he’d always sat on the floor, paranoid that the bed would collapse under his weight. The two had done a trust exercise the very same day. By the next session, he’d ditched the hardwood, the bed not even giving a creak. Really, Marvin wasn’t sure where he’d be without Mendel. 

Eventually, the jury and Cordelia returned to the mock courtroom. Whizzer was wheeling in a large whiteboard, its origin unbeknownst to Marvin and Mendel. Dramatically, the judge walked to her podium, her jurors following like sheep. 

“We have reached an informed decision,” she said, her voice sonorous and loud. “Mr. Brown, if you please,”

With Charlotte’s help, Whizzer wheeled the whiteboard round so everyone was looking at the other side. In blue ink, with a vast array of peculiar diagrams, Cordelia had written “Y’ALL ARE NERDS” in large capitals, with three lines drawn under the final word. 

“Y’all are nerds,” Whizzer supplied helpfully. 

“Not gonna lie, I saw that coming,” Marvin rolled his eyes. “Alright, the trial is over. Can we sleep now?” 

So that’s what they did. Packing up their materials and erasing the ink on the board, the group departed the law block and walked the few miles to Shrek’s Swamp. Mendel lagged behind a little, walking alongside a shivering Marvin. “I guess we should just agree to disagree,”

Shrugging, the curly-haired man stuck out a hand, and they shook on it. “You’re still wrong,”

Coldly, Mendel stared into his laughing eyes. “I will end you,” 

If you’d told Marvin of the past that the frumpy, skinny kid in his Home Ec class would wind up being one of his closest friends, he’d laugh you right out of the room. But he’d come to realise that the ones who’d been labeled, dismissed as one thing or another without a second glance, were some of the most sincere, helpful, and honest people he’d met. And he thanked God that night for the comfortable place he was in at that moment in his whirlwind of a life.


End file.
